I’ve been occupied for a while with our ‘Spring into life’ project. There’s been planning, sourcing, buying, communicating, considering, changing, changing again, graphic designing, advertising, no sleeping, worrying, letter dropping, facebooking, newslettering and laughing all in a big cauldron brew.
After one last sleep deprived week, first of September was finally here with an early start.
Wayne got busy setting up his art
I got busy with mine……
A picture of the calm before the storm
The white chairs lined the boardwalk, the band was setting up. My models were arriving to get ready. 5 dear friends that had said yes, in a moment of weakness. They got sent out in different directions for hair and make up while customers were coming and going, mainly coming.
Greenroom is a tiny, tiny shop, half a dozen customers simultaneously and it’s crowded. I had organised the shop as well as I could. Pretty much all the art was out with Wayne to make room for us. My, desperate-measures-needed-thank-God-for-tiny-wheels-under-shopfitstand-idea, second changeroom was the hiding place for the models garments and also loaded with bags, bags, bags. Models come with bags apparently and big ones.
My original plan was to close the shop for 45 minutes, during fashion show, so we could do our changes of clothes in private and get sorted in peace. That didn’t work out. I had a boutique filled with customers wanting my attention, models undressing in every corner. I was getting dressed, looking for shoes, struggling with jewellery while serving customers. And you can ask my gorgeous, long suffering and gracious model friends about the last couple of minutes when I was trying to explain which way around the walkway. I vaguely remember them telling me to breathe, breathe…….no Lotta a slow breath, take a biiiiiig slow breath. No, you’re not breathing.
And then we went out.
Sharee is wearing a dress in tencel and Lauren and myself are wearing hemp dresses.
Susie is in a bamboo kaftan and the scarf is merino wool.
Lindy is wearing bamboo, pants with an overlay tunic and a silk chiffon kaftan.
Christina is dressed in modal and silk chiffon
The crowd was great, cheering and smiling, Coastal Soul set the pace. Every shop had a first and then a second round. So when we came in from our first walk we had to quickly change into the next outfit and wait for our second turn. The funny thing was, we had customers coming in wanting to buy what they had just seen and no it couldn’t wait. I managed to guide them back out promising I put the garments on hold.
Here we are after the second round, everyone dressed in the gorgeous hand painted silk chiffon kaftans and kimonos. Two minutes after this photo was taken, our shop was jam-packed with customers. I have no photo to show you because I was run of my feet serving and helping. It was messy, noisy, chaotic and loads of fun.
You can’t have your very first fashion parade without a flash-mob zumba. My gorgeous zumba teacher, Mariette had come down to lead us all. I was behind the counter with a line up of customers when I heard the music come on. The shop owner left the customers with a ‘ooops sorry back in a minute, I gotta zumba’.
You can’t see me on this video clip by Patricio but I am there at the back outside greenroom, having a ball.
The zumba was a success. ( If you want to join us, Mariette teaches at Genesis Fitness, at Coffs Coast Health Club and a class at Korora Primary School. )
Coastal Soul kept playing until 1pm while Shearwater Restaurant and Mangrove Jack’s brought out free food samples. The sun kept shining of course. The ‘Spring’ project was always gonna be about fun, colour, friends, good vibes and saying goodbye to winter. I think we did just that.
A big thanks to Gail (Hair at the Promenade) for doing our hair and Beauty on the Promenade for make-up, to Just Joyce for the gorgeous flowers in our hair, to Coastal Soul for awesome music, to everyone that made it down to The Promenade.
The other shops are Retreat Day Spa, Seasons Boutique, Sensara, Melanie Jayne and Kennedy Jewellers.
A really big thanks to my models Lauren, Suzy, Christina, Sharee and Lindy.
greenroomgallery.wordpress.com 
I was surprised that the sun, the people, the models, and the zumba dancers showed up. I live in Australia where people are laid back.
I have used my nickname Lotta my entire life (Charlotte in swedish doesn’t sound near as nice as it does in english) anyway, Lotta is odd to Australians. As simple as it is I usually get ‘what’s was your name did you say?’ and then I say ‘It’s like lotto but with an A at the end’. Well, when we opened the shop I assumed I’d be meeting new people everyday and have business talks on the phone as well so I took on my real name instead, just to avoid the whole ‘lotto’ thing. It felt weirdly awkward for a while. Since I obviously was the only one who acknowledged how awkward it was to be a Charlotte and everyone else got my name without even lifting an eyebrow I decided it was in fact a bright idea. My friends from life before greenroom have now stopped laughing every time they ring the shop and get the new name. Long story about a very short name.
Yep, the springthing was a total success and among the other business owners I was the flavour of the week which included flowers and breakfast. Nice since I am the newcomer, with the smallest shop and least experience.
I have customers that read my blog but they rarely comment at all. So when my favourite blogger reads and comments I am thankful in a totally embarrassed and excitedly surprised kind of way. Thanks!:-)
It looks as though you did a great job. Were you surprised by the number of people who showed up? Everyone seems to be enjoying themselves. Congratulations — and you survived the winter, too.
Your friends call you Lotta?